Major startups not recruiting at IITs this year

While many startups have stayed away, several are being screened by placement teams before they are allowed to visit the tech campuses.Hemali Chhapia | TNN | November 07, 2016, 09:30 IST

Startups do not seem to be the flavour of this placement season. The Indian Institutes of Technology have seen a 50% fall in the number of startups that will be present for the campus recruitment drive. Missing conspicuously are e-commerce unicorns Flipkart, Paytm, OlaCabs and Snapdeal that haven't yet signed up to shop at any of the IITs.

While the response from startups has been tepid, overall it's a happy placement season for IITs with pre-placement offers up by 25-30% compared to last year.

Earlier this year, the IITs barred 31 firms, including Grofers, baby clothing website Hopscotch, Portea Medical and a host of other startups, from participating in their placement drives. They were blacklisted for a year for "playing with the careers of students" by making last-minute changes to their offers, revoking offer letters, falsely hiring them for affiliates and delaying joining dates.

IITs screening startups to check funding, stability

The All IIT Placement Committee, which decided to blacklist these companies, estimated that around 135 students from across IITs were affected by these companies' actions.

While many startups have stayed away, several are being screened by placement teams before they are allowed to visit the tech campuses. At IIT-Madras, 54 startups have registered. Last year, 98 were present. At IIT-Bombay, there are fewer startups among companies that have listed to recruit. "We are screening the companies that want to recruit from our campus," said a placement team member of IIT-Kanpur.

"Their funding, cash flow and the year of founding, essentially their stability, is what we are checking," he added. From the Roorkee campus, 52 startups had recruited last year; this year, only 35 registered. "There is a significant decrease in the number of startups that have registered for placement drives this year due to funds crunch and other market issues," said placement head N P Padhy.

Some regulars too have not yet signed up: Delhivery, Mad Street Den, Aura Semiconductor and Practo. "We encourage good startups to participate in placements," said Padhy. While large e-commerce companies have not yet confirmed their participation, some IITs are in touch with them. "It could be possible that they do not have manpower requirement. It really hasn't been a great year for many startups," said another placement dean, on condition of anonymity. The process of empanelling firms wanting to recruit talent from the IIT campuses is open until the end of November.

"Until last year, most of the startups used to sign up early on. Also, the firms that were blacklisted made up about 30%-40% of the startups that used to visit all the IITs. So it was certain that the numbers would fall this year," said a placement dean.